.TH "diffball" "1" "Sept 25 2003" "" ""
.SH "NAME"
diffball
.SH "SYNOPSIS"
.PP
diffball from-tarball to-tarball [-f format] patch
.PP
.SH "DESCRIPTION"
diffball is a program for identifying the changes between two (versionned) 
tar files, and encoding those changes in a binary patch\&.
For tarball's, diffball performs better then differ typically\&.
.SH "OPTIONS"
.PP
.nf

-V, --version                   output version, and exit
-v, --verbose                   increase verbosity
-c, --to-stdout                 output patch to stdout
-b, --seed-len SIZE             set the starting seed size to look for\&. 
                                For example, -b 32 would only be able to 
                                find matches 32 bytes or larger
-s, --sample-rate SKIP          the sampling rate for checksum's\&.  -s 2 
                                would cause diffball to add one checksum 
                                for every other byte\&.  Used with -a, it 
                                is a way to cut down on the needed 
                                memory\&.
-a, --hash-size SIZE            the hash size to use\&.  
                                diffball normally attempts to use a size 
                                for the hash array that is that of the
                                file for small files, decreasing the 
                                ratio as the file size increases\&.
-f, --patch-format FORMAT       used to control what format diffball
                                outputs in\&.
                                Valid formats are-
                                bdelta, gdiff4, gdiff5 (a nonstandard 
                                modification to gdiff4), bdiff, and
                                switching\&.
                                Default is switching\&.
.fi
.PP
.SH "SEE ALSO"
.PP
differ(1)
patcher(1)
convert_delta(1)
.PP
.SH "BUGS"
none known
.PP
.SH "VERSION"
.PP
This man page is current for version 0&.7&.1 of diffball
.PP
.SH "CREDITS"
diffball, and by extension the entire diffball suite, is distributed under the GNU 
public license\&.  The file COPYING contains the details\&.
.PP
.SH "AUTHOR"
differ was written by Brian Harring <ferringb@gmail&.com>
